When did flying stop being the most glamorous thing a person could possibly do?
What kind of industry fixes its own prices by law, and then competes on how much champagne it can pour?
And what happened to the man who broke it?
Sir Freddie Laker swept floors at an aircraft factory, worked out that the entire airline business was upside down, and got taken apart for it — Peter Frankopan and Afua Hirsch on the man whose bankruptcy made your budget flight possible.
For most of the twentieth century the airlines ran a legal cartel. IATA fixed the fares, so a London to New York ticket cost the same on Pan Am, TWA or BA, and the only thing left to compete on was luxury: forty inches of legroom, professional chefs, sterling silver, a side of beef carved in the aisle. It was magnificent, and roughly eighty-five per cent of people never got on a plane. Then Laker put a transatlantic seat on sale for fifty-nine pounds and let people queue on the pavement outside Victoria for it. The industry drove him under inside five years, then adopted everything he had done. What is left is a world where five billion people fly each year, three per cent of them internationally, and the seat in front of you gets a little closer every season.
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[0:00] Peter hates airports, Afua loves them, and the words \"you're a Terminal Five girl\"
[5:19] The legal cartel — how IATA fixed every fare and left nothing to compete on but champagne
[6:39] Forty inches of legroom, a chef, and a side of beef carved at your seat
[8:13] Nail polish, posture, and the finishing-school standards applied to an air hostess
[11:36] Freddie Laker, the Canterbury boy who swept factory floors and broke the cartel
[13:23] Fifty-nine pounds to New York, and people sleeping on the pavement outside Victoria
[21:57] Four per cent of climate change, and the cities buckling under weekend visitors
[30:57] Why business class keeps improving while your seat keeps getting thinner
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Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas:
Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com
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